Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / Strengthening Nursing Culture and Workforce Innovation at Touro Infirmary with Quanna Batiste Brown

Transcript

Strengthening Nursing Culture and Workforce Innovation at Touro Infirmary with Quanna Batiste Brown · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

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  The most important health care decisions don't happen
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  in isolation.
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  They happen when leaders come together.
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  Becker's sixteenth annual meeting brings together more than
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  3,500
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  hospital and health system executives this April in
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  Chicago.
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  With 800 speakers from Ascension, Cleveland Clinic, CommonSpirit
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  and more, the conversations get real. Leaders will
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  share how their scenario planning for policy shifts,
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  breaking through value based care barriers and building
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  clinical teams that translate new ideas into real
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  world care.
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  Join top decision makers in the room April
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  13 through the sixteenth.
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  For the agenda and event details, visit beckers
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  hospital review dot com and click on the
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  events tab in the upper right.
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  This is Laura Dirda with the Becker's Healthcare
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  podcast.
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  I'm thrilled today to be joined by Quanah
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  Baptiste, vice president of patient care services and
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  chief nursing officer
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  for Touro Infirmary
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  at LCMC Health. Quanah, it's a pleasure to
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  have you on the podcast today. Wonderful, Laura.
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  Thank you for having me. I'm really excited
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  to speak with you today.
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  Absolutely. And, you know, I'm looking forward to
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  learning a little bit more about some of
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  the cool things you've been up to over
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  the last year or so and then how
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  you're thinking about the future. But before we
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  dive in, can you tell us a little
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  bit more about yourself and the organization?
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  Absolutely. So, I'm a New Orleans native,
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  and have been a nurse for almost thirty
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  years now. More than twenty of that has
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  been in leadership roles And currently serving at
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  Touro Infirmary as chief nursing officer, Touro is
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  very unique here in New Orleans. It's a
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  170
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  year old community anchor with a really strong
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  legacy in women's services, rehab,
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  and comprehensive whole person care. So it's really
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  exciting to be a part of LCMC
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  health health system, which is an eight hospital
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  health system,
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  really, a newly forming health system within the
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  past years with the commitment to, you know,
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  expand our access, you know, advancing quality, and
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  ensuring that, every patient has a great experience
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  and, receives that high reliable care.
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  So, you know, as chief nursing officer, my
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  role is to strengthen the professional practice of
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  nursing, really working and focusing on building healthy
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  work environments,
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  aligning clinical operations with our mission. So really,
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  looking forward to,
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  improving patient outcomes and building an engaged workforce.
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  I love that. I think that's, you know,
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  such a strong and important mission, but definitely
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  not an easy task to do, especially in
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  health care these days. And so and, Kimmy,
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  is first and foremost, can you tell us
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  a little bit more about,
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  a project or initiative you led in the
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  last year? What did you do and what
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  were the results?
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  Absolutely. The most significant project that I've worked
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  on in the past year is the redesign
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  of our nursing infrastructure
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  focused on stabilizing nursing operations
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  and rebuilding
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  the healthy practice environment. You know, this included,
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  establishing a formal department of nursing education and
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  professional
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  development.
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  With that, we've, implemented our LCMC heart ladder
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  so that we have recognition for advanced certification
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  for nurses.
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  Really, passionate about leadership. So re redesigning and
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  realigning our leadership structure to improve that accountability
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  across,
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  spans of control was really exciting for me,
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  and then introducing workforce analysis to address turnover,
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  contract labor, focusing on productivity so that we
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  can be operationally
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  operationally
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  efficient.
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  And as a result of that work, we,
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  improved our staff's capability,
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  you know, reducing the reliance on,
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  overtime and agency labor. And, you know, we're
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  really able to,
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  see some meaningful gains in engagement
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  in our quality metrics. You know? Focusing on
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  that financial stewardship
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  was also something that helped to strengthen our
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  nursing operations team and bring us closer in
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  alignment with our budget and our productivity
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  targets. So, you know, for me, over the
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  past year, it's really, looking at the quality,
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  you know, understanding and focusing on our workforce
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  well-being and, you know, making sure that our
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  leadership team was aligned with, fiscal responsibility
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  and advancing care together.
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  I love that. I I think it just
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  really touches on so many aspects of health
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  care that are important today. You know, in
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  delivering that quality care and everything else really
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  depends on a great workforce and staff and
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  team working
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  together to make that happen. And so I'm
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  curious, you know, when you look at this
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  transition to bringing in and strengthening your internal
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  pipeline for your workforce and talent development,
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  how do you really do that while keeping
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  an eye on those, you know, operational
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  benchmarks
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  in things that you need in order to
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  improve productivity while also keeping it a great
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  place to work and understanding well-being,
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  and,
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  you know, avoiding burnout and all those kinds
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  of things? What are some of the the
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  ways that you've been able to kind of
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  inject more of that performance culture in without,
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  you know, pushing some of your your great
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  team members,
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  to become more stressed out by some of
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  these transformations and changes that every organization, quite
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  frankly, has had to make?
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  Yeah. Absolutely. You know, balance is everything.
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  And, you know, focusing on that workforce resilience
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  and retention, we've done something pretty innovative, and
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  it's looking at,
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  incivility and the experience of,
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  not only the patient experience, but the the
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  the experience
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  of the staff.
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  So, we're going through right now with our
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  leadership team some work that's focused on incivility,
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  looking at the impact of incivility, and how
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  do we build a culture of compassionate care
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  within our leadership team that is really focused
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  on giving the leaders the tools that they
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  need in order
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  to better address things that happen in the
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  workplace that we may have gone
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  in oversight as sort of the pink elephant
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  in the room. So, you know, we're really
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  focused in honing in on, you know, eliminating
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  that incivility and burnout, you know, because we
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  do have a heavy focus in women's
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  incivility and burnout. You know, because we do
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  have a heavy focus in women's services, you
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  know, we have just hired in a new
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  senior director for women's services. So looking towards
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  promoting that maternal health excellence, you know, advancing
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  our national quality metrics,
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  safety and equity, and then, you know, hoping
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  to have balanced staffing models that will ensure
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  we have operational reliability. So we do have
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  a virtual nursing platform here. So those are
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  the things that we are leveraging in order
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  to, you know, work through the change culture
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  and, you know, focus in on working through
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  not having that burnout.
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  That makes a lot of sense. And, you
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  know, it is really helpful to understand and
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  get inside some of the ways that you're
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  looking at, you know, making these changes and
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  building a culture,
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  in addressing that instability as well. Now looking
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  ahead, how are you thinking about some of
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  your big priorities and headwinds for 2026?
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  Absolutely. So those headwinds, you know, looking at
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  the national workforce shortage,
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  you know, developing a pipeline and strengthening the
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  pipeline, it really starts with, you know, the
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  foundational
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  approach of ensuring that our education teams are
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  ready to accept those new grads, but then
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  creating the environment that they're that they're really
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  willing to stay within that first year. So
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  it's really having that disciplined prioritization, you know,
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  having those regional partners, partnering with different universities
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  across the region where we can ensure that
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  we're having those conversations. You know, we have
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  new graduates coming in all the time, sitting
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  down with them, having lunch with them, understanding
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  what it is that they see that they
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  would need to make us an employer of
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  of choice, and then also investing in that
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  innovative care model. Like I mentioned earlier, virtual
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  nursing, ensuring that we have ways to support
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  the staff.
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  You know, we can add, you know,
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  additional nurses as much as we would like
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  to, so using virtual options and, you know,
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  understanding how we could leverage technology in order
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  to make those things better.
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  We're currently looking at,
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  AI, so ambient listening, specifically in our home
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  health team. So we've implemented that,
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  with our EMR in home health, and we've
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  already leveraged and been able to see wins
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  with, you know, decreasing the documentation burden on
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  the nurses who are working in that environment.
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  So I think it's really addressing the headwinds
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  of workforce
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  shortage through digital transformation.
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  Absolutely. I I love that. I think, you
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  know, having that technology and now more than
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  ever being able to,
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  be interconnected, have more information at our fingertips,
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  and and figure out how
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  you can leverage AI smartly to augment the,
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  team that you have there and and make
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  their jobs, you know, easier, more streamlined, as
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  well as more personable as they're working with
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  the patients. It seems to make a lot
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  of sense.
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  When you're thinking about the technologies,
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  you mentioned having, you know, the discipline priority
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  and and what you're,
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  selecting to incorporate into the health system. And
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  and once you make those decisions, you know,
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  how do you ensure that you're getting the
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  value from that investment as well as, you
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  know, your your teams are adopting it at
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  the rate they need to in order for
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  it to really have that beneficial impact you're
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  looking for? Absolutely. So it's really about establishing
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  those KPIs early on. So understanding what those
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  key performance
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  indicators will be and measuring them. And then,
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  based on that measurement, you know, having that
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  routine structured measurement. So when,
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  there is something that we didn't predict that
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  we're able to course correct,
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  we've done that with our virtual nursing that
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  we have inpatient. We saw an opportunity. We
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  were able to leverage those virtual nurses and
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  have them support admissions as well as discharges
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  so that we're able to improve our throughput.
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  So I think it's, you know, looking at
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  what the KPIs are, reading them, and then
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  understanding what the data is telling us to
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  be able to make better decisions forward.
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  That's helpful to understand and, you know, really,
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  important aspect of building that smart workforce of
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  the future.
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  Now what do you think the hardest thing
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  you'll have to do in the coming year
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  will be?
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  At in the coming year, the hardest thing
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  that I foresee is culture change, you know,
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  and maintaining that culture change at a pace,
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  where you're also maintaining the trust. You know,
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  health systems are being asked to do rapid
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  transformation,
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  and yet caregivers need stability and psychological safety.
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  So, you know, the way that we balance
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  that is, you know, being responsible, you know,
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  looking to hold high standards without losing that
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  human connection. So the way that I do
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  that is is in listening section sessions. I
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  have quality time with Quanta. And in quality
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  time with Quanta, it's an opportunity for me
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  to sit with the staff, an unscripted time
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  to meet on a monthly basis just to
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  hear about the impacts of the change and
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  make sure that we're hearing it. It's through
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  leveraging shared governance, making sure that we have,
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  the frontline staff and the leadership staff and
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  interprofessional colleagues working towards,
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  a better Touro, and the way that we
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  do that is hearing everyone's voice. So it's,
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  you know, it's really hard to do cultural
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  culture change, but I think that when you
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  have, the folks around you participating in that
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  change, it's more likely to be sustained.
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  Absolutely. I couldn't agree more. And, you know,
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  I love that idea of quality time with
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  Quanta.
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  You know, how candid do people get in
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  those conversations?
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  And what, if anything, can you found kind
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  of surprising about that type of forum?
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  What what I what I found surprising is
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  that just having the forum,
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  people feel safe. Right? And and usually, the
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  things that come up, it's like we don't
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  have anything to say until something happens, and
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  then everyone has something to say. So I
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  think for me, what was surprising to me
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  is just that this most recent meeting, you
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  know, speaking with the staff and then talking
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  and throwing out ideas about how to improve
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  a process. Most recently, we were talking about
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  nurse residency and how I can better connect
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  with the nurse residents. And, you know, I
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  had thrown out the idea of a champion
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  award for nurse residents, and it was well
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  received. But I think had I not yet
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  had the quality time with Quanta, it I
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  wouldn't have had an opportunity
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  to connect with the nurses who connect to
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  the residents to get that synergy.
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  So, you know, what I've recognized is that,
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  you know, I have to be available and
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  open to hear,
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  but it it's not always that you get
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  the messages that you were expecting.
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  Oh, I can imagine you get a variety
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  of things that haven't come across your desk
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  through these types of forums and others, which
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  is really cool to have that relationship with
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  your team,
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  you know, that they have comforted in doing
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  that and and being able to make improvements
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  in that space. So,
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  I love that.
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  Now before we wrap up here, I wanted
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  to ask you about growth too. Where do
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  you see some of the best opportunities for
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  organizational growth in the future?
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  Yeah. For us here at Touro, you know,
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  we're focusing on women and family services, you
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  know, looking at our women's service line to
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  see what can we do to expand and
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  to reach more patients.
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  Our rehab department is really growing.
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  Just yesterday, we opened another seven beds, which
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  is no small feat, so we're able to
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  care for more patients,
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  in real time. And then also focusing on
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  the academic workforce partnership.
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  We have here Warren Eastern High School, where
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  we're starting,
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  just this month bringing in the PCT program.
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  So these will be twelfth graders that are
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  in a PCT program at high school, and
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  they're gonna come and do their externship hours
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  here. So it's really looking creatively,
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  for where the best opportunities for organizational growth
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  would be and then leveraging those if they're
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  not created internally, then looking at our external
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  partners to make that happen.
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  Oh, fantastic.
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  You know, and it seems like really then
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  you're not only investing in the organization, but
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  the community as well.
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  Absolutely. Yes. It's all about the community.
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  Awesome. Well, Quana, thank you so much for
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  joining us on the podcast today. This has
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  been a really fun conversation. I can tell
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  how passionate you are about what you do
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  in the,
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  patients that you serve, and, you know, I
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  I'm looking forward to continuing on this conversation
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  and working with you again in the future.
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  Wonderful. Thank you so much, Laura, for your
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  time. I really enjoyed spending time with you
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  and with Becker's and sharing what we're doing
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  here over Turo.